Banking wetland mitigation credits is complicated, but may have benefits
Excerpt
In June 2002, the town of Roseau, in northern Minnesota, was literally washed away. Many people lost homes and businesses and surrounding farmland was flooded. But 15 miles out of town Arne Heggedal walked across the edge of the wetland that he owns with Jerry Krog, “At the end of it, I could walk across the ditch with my loafers,” says Heggedal. “It held all the water on that 480 acres. Nothing left it.”
Wetlands not only hold floodwater, they filter and recharge groundwater, provide habitat for migratory birds and endangered species and add aesthetic value to the landscape. But overall wetlands are decreasing in the United States at a rate of 58,545 acres per year between 1986 and 1997 according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Recently a small group of conservation-minded farmers like Heggedal, along with nonprofit farming organizations, have returned farmland to wetlands, creating “agricultural” wetland mitigation banks. These banks sell affordable wetland mitigation credits exclusively to farmers or sell some credits to farmers at a cheaper rate. Under the “swampbuster” provisions of the 1985 Food Security Act, commodity producers must mitigate or compensate for …
Footnotes
Pat Hemminger is a freelance writer based in Canada.
- Copyright 2003 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
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